Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
Saturniidae

Saturniidae

1 9.9
A large family of moths with very big, colorful species
  • noun
  • /səˈtɜrnɪˌiːdə/
  • Specialized
: Saturniidae
  • The Saturniidae family includes the giant silk moth.

Examples

  • The Saturniidae family contains some of the world's largest and most colorful moths.

  • Many members of the Saturniidae have impressive eye spots on their wings to deter predators.

  • Biologists discovered a new species within the Saturniidae during their expedition.

  • Many Saturniidae species are known for their large size.

  • Biologists discovered a new species within the Saturniidae during their expedition.

  • Many members of the Saturniidae have impressive eye spots on their wings to deter predators.

  • The Saturniidae family contains some of the world's largest and most colorful moths.

Surface Forms

Saturniidae singular
Saturniids plural

Morphology

Saturniidae = Saturnia (opaque) = Saturni + idae

Formed by a Latinized genus stem plus the technical taxonomic suffix '-idae' meaning 'family', which is specialist morphology unlikely to be transparent to an average B1 learner.

Etymology

Saturniidae comes from Saturn, the Roman god and planet, plus the scientific ending -idae that shows it is an animal 'family'. Many of these moths are very large and have round, ring-like eye spots on their wings, so a helpful image is to think of them as 'Saturn' moths — big and ringed like the planet, which explains the name.